June 18, 2014

Fiction Finder and Dewey, Part 2: Place, Genre, Language

(See previous post Fiction Finder and Dewey, Part 1, for background information about Fiction Finder. Search results reflect searches done June 18, 2014, with the underlying database current through April; results may change as the database is updated.)

In Fiction Finder, "Place" is usually where the story is set, and many authors write about places not their home. For example, an Advanced Search under "Place" for Italy retrieves 8956 records, but none of the first ten records is for a work by an Italian author; seven are by Shakespeare (e.g., The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice), and the others are by Henry James, Laurence Sterne, and E.M. Forster. A user who seeks fiction set in Italy by Italian authors will have to go to record 19 in the set to find it: The Name of the Rose, by Umberto Eco. Here is the start of the full record.

Clicking the Dewey number in that record (853.914 Italian fiction--1945-1999) retrieves 4839 records for works originally written in Italian—many of them set in Italy, e.g., The Leopard, by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa. Here is the start of the full record.

To broaden the range of Italian literature to include all literary periods and to focus on works set in Italy, one can truncate the Dewey number and search under "Dewey" for 85* and under "Place" for Italy; 1180 records are retrieved. One can then narrow the search by selecting from the "Genre" list at the left. For example, one user might select "Short stories," retrieve a set of 11 records, and choose Rome Tales: Stories. Here is the start of the full record.

Another user, faced with 1180 records, might choose "Detective and mystery stories" and retrieve 47 records. Nine of the first ten records are for works by Andrea Camilleri, e.g., Rounding the Mark. Here is the start of the full record.

Let’s try another place: Ireland. An Advanced Search under "Place" for Ireland retrieves 7391 records. Two of the first ten records are for works by American authors, e.g., The Death of an Irish Sinner: A Peter McGarr Mysteryby Bartholomew Gill, classed in 813.54 American fiction--1945-1999), and eight are for works by Irish authors writing in English, e.g., Tara Road, by Maeve Binchy. Here is the start of the full record.

The standard Dewey number for works by an individual author writing in English (e.g., 823.914 English fiction--1945-1999) does not indicate whether the author is Irish. In this context, what is a quick way for a user to find out? In the full record, the user can click the cover art to go to the corresponding record in WorldCat.org, scroll down in that record and click to "find more information about" the author—in other words, go to the WorldCat Identities page for the author, e.g., for Maeve Binchy—and if appropriate, scroll down to find the "Useful Links" to the Library of Congress Authority File record and the Wikipedia article for the author.

How can a user of Fiction Finder find works written originally in Irish Gaelic, if the user doesn’t have in mind a specific author or title, and doesn’t know the Dewey number? (Note: Dewey numbers are searchable in Fiction Finder, but not their captions; the captions are displayed only to explain the meaning of the Dewey numbers.) An Advanced Search under "Language" for Irish and under "Place" for Ireland retrieves 364 records—many of them not originally written in Irish, but having at least one edition translated into Irish. (The Editions section of a full record has information about specific editions and their languages.) The tenth record in the set of 364 is in Irish, An béal boċt; : nó, An milleánach. Droċ-sgéal ar an droċṡaoġal curta i n-eagar le Myles na gCopaleen. Here is the start of the full record.

Clicking on 891.6234 Gaelic fiction—Irish—1875-1999 retrieves 118 records. The first record is for Exile, by Pádraic Ó Conaire. Here is the start of the full record.

The listed editions are all in English, but the edition details say "translated from the Irish by Gearailt Mac Eoin."

December 2016

OCLC

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